The present patent application concerns a feeding station for a splicer of a rotary offset printing press, of the type including a feeding device for feeding a paper reel into a splicer, an unpack station for unpacking a paper reel and a first buffer station for storing an unpacked and prepared paper reel.
Known feeding stations include an unpack station for unpacking a paper reel, a buffer station for buffering the unpacked reel and a feeding device for feeding a paper reel into the splicer. Splicers are also called “pasters” or “reel changers”. In the following the term “splicer” is used synonymously for pasters and reel changers.
In the known devices, a track leads from the unpacking station directly to the buffer station and directly from the buffer station to the feeding device.
The buffer station is necessary, as unpacking the reel takes usually longer than feeding it into the splicer. Hence, when a new reel needs to be fed into the splicer, the new reel must already be unpacked and prepared.
Also, the used reels are usually taken off the splicer one by one and disposed of immediately. This operation is cumbersome.
The known layout of the feeding device takes up a great amount of space.